Difference between revisions of "Why Do Women Have Longer Lives Than Men"

Revision as of 23:24, 13 January 2022

Everywhere in the world women live longer than men - but this was not always the case. The available data from rich countries shows that women didn't live longer than men in the 19th century. What is the reason women are more likely to live longer than men? And how has this advantage gotten larger over time? We only have a few clues and the evidence isn't sufficient to draw an unambiguous conclusion. While we are aware that there are biological, behavioral as well as environmental factors which all play a part in women who live longer than males, we aren't sure the extent to which each factor plays a role.

We have learned that women live longer than men, regardless of weight. But this is not because of certain biological factors have changed. What are these changing factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. There are others that are more intricate. For example, العاب زوجية there is evidence that in rich countries the female advantage increased in part because infectious diseases used to affect women disproportionately a century ago, so advances in medicine that reduced the long-term health burden from infectious diseases, especially for survivors, ended up raising women's longevity disproportionately.

Everywhere in the world women tend to live longer than men
The first chart below shows life expectancy at birth for men and women. It is clear that every country is above the diagonal line of parity. This implies that a baby girl from every country could be expected to live for longer than her brothers.

This chart is interesting in that it shows that the advantage of women exists in all countries, difference between countries is huge. In Russia, women live for 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan, the difference is just half a year.

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In the richer countries, the female advantage in longevity was not as great.
Let's look at how female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The following chart shows the men and women's life expectancies when they were born in the US in the years 1790 to 2014. Two specific points stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. as well as women in the US live a lot, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is increasing: While the female advantage in life expectancy used to be tiny It has significantly increased over time.

By selecting 'Change Country from the chart, check that these two points also apply to the other countries having available information: Sweden, France and the UK.